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| 2005/10/13 [Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:40057 Activity:low |
10/12 link:tinyurl.com/e3uvg (nytimes.com) FEMA paying avg $59/night to put 600,000 post-Katrina/Rita victims in hotels, because conservative ideology kept FEMA from giving vouchers to families for much cheaper apartments, like in pre-Dubya days. \_ why do you hate black people? \_ Do you think FEMA pays for room service and the mini bar too? How about pay per view porn? \_ In the name of social justice and equal access, they certainly should! |
| 2005/10/13 [Politics/Domestic, Politics/Domestic/President] UID:40058 Activity:moderate |
10/12 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9629463/site/newsweek Conservative columnist George Will: "Conservatives are not supposed to be cuddly, or even particularly nice. They are, however, supposed to be competent. And to know that scarcity--of money, virtue, wisdom, competence, everything--forces choices. Furthermore, they are supposed to have an unsentimental commitment to meritocracy and excellence. The fact that none of those responsible for the postwar planning, or lack thereof, in Iraq have been sacked suggests--no, shouts--that in Washington today there is no serious penalty for serious failure. Hence the multiplication of failures." \_ No, the conservatives have only one main function, and that is to keep the liberals out of power. \_ No, you're confusion conservatives and liberals with R's and D's. \_ "Duh" -- good link \_ Those aren't really Conservative values, but more military values. Conservatives are supposed to say "praise Jesus" all day and strive for theocracy. |
| 2005/10/13 [Politics/Foreign/MiddleEast/Iraq] UID:40059 Activity:nil |
10/12 http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/13/international/middleeast/13intel.html Review on CIA performance "acknowledged the deep failures in the agency's prewar assessments of Iraq's weapons programs but said 'the analysis was right' on cultural and political issues related to postwar Iraq. ... 'strong regional and country expertise developed over time' within American intelligence agencies, as opposed to ... heavy reliance on 'technical analysis' for what proved to be misleading or inaccurate information about Iraq's weapons programs." |
| 2005/10/13 [Computer/SW/Unix, Computer/SW/Security, Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:40060 Activity:nil |
10/12 root, please do not squish me for posting this treasonous
url anonymously. also the picture is wrong, p bush
was funding them until 1951.
http://www.indybay.org/uploads/p1090147a.jpg - danh
\_ It's been nice knowing you danh, I shall miss you after your
mysterious disappearance.
\_ Huh, I didn't realize we were into punishing the sons for the
sins of the fathers. |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Computer/SW/Unix, Computer/SW/Security] UID:40061 Activity:very high |
10/12 [moved to top]
I strongly suggest everyone read the minutes from the last
meeting. Both changes to the motd and soda itself were
discussed. -jrleek
\_ (Put up front since it's relevant) One thing that was left out of
the minutes is this: although we decided to enable logging of the
MOTD, we would like the implementation to be put in place by the
users OF the MOTD. The decision stands and is not debatable, but
the flavor of it is up to you guys. The current proposition is
to enable kernel auditing, such that only root can view the logs.
If you have a more palatable idea, you're welcome to submit your
opinions to root@csua. Of course, 'ideas' are not nearly as
useful as 'implementations', if you propose something non-trivial.
\_ I don't have any complaint on any of this. I just like to
ask if you guys can consider making the list of people who
have root public, and tighten access control to only those
who should have root. Secondly, I'd like to ask if you guys
can make all user complaints and requests to expose offenders
public. I'd hate to see root exercising power under the hood
without any form of auditing. Without public auditing
there is no check and no balance.
\_ Why perpetuate the scam and make us lend the logging an air of
respectability?
\_ I am amused by the fact that this was posted anonymously. -gm
\_ Exact proposition: "To allow, when necessary, root-types to
identify exactly who posted any message in the MOTD"
\_ If I read these correctly, the change that will be implemented is
a foolproof way for root-types to know who is posting to the motd,
so that people who make direct threats can be found. Somehow I
doubt this is gonna raise the quality of the discourse around
here.
\_ The problem is we've apparently seen root-type people abuse their
root in the past to un-anon people on the motd they simply don't
like. I'd like to know who the root-type people are and that
there is some official (as official as the csua can get) process
in place to a) make sure no one else has root and b) make sure
the very limited set of people with root are known and c) revoke
root privs of abusers. I was once in favor of a totally anon
motd, but given some of the vicious and excessive personal
attacks, threats, and named posts clearly intended to destroy
other people, I've changed my mind on the topic. Free speech
is a good thing but yelling fire in a theatre is not ok nor is
abusing anonymity to harass or ruin others.
\_ The root list has been getting cleaned up, and I have made
sure that the only people with root on any of the new
machines are active, trustworthy root types. Furthermore,
abuse of root power by anyone to un-anonymify someone for
any reason other than official business is an immediately
squishable offense in my book. If I caught someone using
root logs to spite someone on the motd, I would not hesitate
to not only revoke the root cookie, but also sorry that
person's account. I would even take such action on a
current member of Politburo if they did such. I consider
the privacy of the people on this server, and the
professionalness of those who have access to priviledged
information on this server very important. - jvarga
\_ You are a thin-skinned idiot.
\_ Haven't been around here that long, huh?
\_ Only about 8 years. What'd I miss?
\_ Pfft. n00b! -meyers
\_ You missed the part where not abusing root is a good
thing, and an obvious thing. Where have you been?
\_ Vicious and excessive personal attacks? Perhaps, but the
motd is not for the faint of heart. This is less "fire" in a
theater and more theater of the absurd. More Sproul Plaza than
debate club. Keep it anon. How else am I supposed to make my
snide "yermom" comments without looking like a total sleeze?
\_ yer mom doesn't mind looking like a total sleaze.
\_ You're correct that too many people have root. We'll get
an automatic reset when we switch to new soda, we should
set up some new rules then.
\_ So let's say some user provides a web- or e-mail based front-end to
let anonymous types modify motd. The soda log will show that the
creator of the interface is making changes, even though it could be
Joe Loser off the Internet. I suppose at the first abuse then that
interface should be shut off?
\_ Before the first abuse; it's against policy to share your
account. -tom
\_ Has this specific example been tested yet? ("share your
account" encompasses providing a web/e-mail interface for
people outside soda to anonymously modify motd)
\_ "share your account" means whatever they want it to mean.
\_ This would also qualify under "don't be a hoser." -tom
\_ Just curious, but how many of you outraged motders are actual
csua voters?
\_ I'm disappointed that the CSUA would run Linux, I'm not sure what
the issue was with BSD. There was a big push to get it working
at the end of last year, and as far as I know it was. What
happened? --jwm
\_ How competent is the vp? This is not intended to be a put
down as such, but failing to get bsd to boot may be
\_ How competent is the vp? Failing to get bsd to boot may be
meaningful or meaningless, depending on vp cluefulness.
\_ As freebsd developers have trouble getting 5.4 to run on
certain amd boxes, I wouldn't use this as a guide to VP
cluefulness
\_ You do know that my question regarding vp cluefulness
still applies until you show (boot_bsd(clueless admin)
== 1) for all values of clueless admin.
\_ What's wrong with Linux these days? (Aside from TRADITION!)
\_ If you have to ask, you don't know.
\_ Yes, that would be why I'm asking.
\_ Install the 2.6 kernel and see how long it lasts
under load.
\- can you elaborate on this a little. i have some
crunching farms and the people who run them for
me appear to slowly be moving toward 2.6. tnx. |
| 2005/10/13 [Politics/Domestic, Academia/Berkeley/CSUA] UID:40062 Activity:nil |
10/13 Are there more details on the proposed changes to the CSUA constitution?
Meeting minutes so far have not included much information on this
subject. |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Academia/Berkeley/CSUA/Troll/Jblack, Academia/Berkeley/CSUA/Motd] UID:40063 Activity:very high |
10/13 Now that we're making a user-tracking, totalitarian motd in the
future, I want to use all the remaining freedom to insult people.
Whoever proposed this idea, fuck you. Paolo is an ass and
all heil German John. Viva la libertarian-style motd!!!
\_ What is wrong with root having a way to track who posted what when
someone complains about inappropriate behavior on the motd? Why is
everyone complaining? The fact that Politburo has had to make the
decision to put a system in place to keep a log is not a symptom of
a "totalitarian regime," but rather a forum where people's blatant
disrespect for each other caused a problem that had to be addressed.
You will still have your anonymity so you can troll away at each
other, but root will finally have the ability to look at a private
log IF AND WHEN the need arises to take care of issues that get out
of hand. No one will be monitoring the log, lording over you with
the wiggling finger. Life will continue on as normal. But finally,
those anonymous cowards who use unconventional motd posting means to
threaten others will have to check themselves knowing that if they
make a real threat and someone complains, that there will be
judgment on their not-so-anonymous self. The only people
complaining about root having logs are those who are the people
doing the threatening and are worried that they cannot continue to
do so anonymously. Get a life, grow up, and be civil to each other
(insult each other all you want, we don't care. Just don't cross
the line and make real threats.). Sheesh. - jvarga
\_ The problem as I see it isn't so much the tracking mechanism,
but the vagueness of the standard for breaking anonymity in a
forum where some pretty hot-topic issues are often addressed.
I'm rather uncomfortable knowing that we are giving power to
tantrumy admins without any real limitations or clear standards
of application. Honestly, don't our stewards have more important
things to do than chase after lackwit trolls? -mice
\_ If all they're really doing is logging this shit somewhere, I don't
think it will matter. What the cowards who like censorship fail
to understand is how many of the trolls have the personality that
tends to tell people to go fuck themselves straight to their face.
Overall, I don't think the level of debate is really that much
lower here than at the national level anyway. Don't forget we
recently had the Vice President of the United States tell a
senator to go fuck himself, on record, in the senate.
\_ It isn't about trolls. Trolling is one of the 'fun' things about
anonymity. If you're going to get ballistic when someone posts a
random link you deserve what you get. I see the problem being
with people who instead of saying "fuck you" (which is just
stupid), make threats to life, limb, reputation, etc. At that
point there needs to be recourse, otherwise the CSUA is just
providing a means to attempt to ruin another person with no way
for the victim to even know who is doing it much less have a
chance of stopping it. Trolling is posting random stupid links.
Going after someone in a personal way is not trolling. That is
harassment at a minimum and shouldn't be tolerated. This comes
back to the question raised several weeks ago about fresh blood
on the motd. Why would any new person want to step into such an
environment? And why can't we have an environment better than
the rest of the net or the Senate floor, or where ever? Just
because another place sucks is no reason we have to emulate that.
\_ I think you summarised the reasoning (if not improved upon
it) during the meeting. We were thinking that it really
wasn't a constructive thing for people to be abusing the
anonimity to threaten others. This is absolutely not intended
to be a "politburo intends to be the thought police" system.
The logs will also be root-only accessible and we're toying
with putting in a system such that you need two members of
root to access them. -mrauser
\_ Just out of silly curiosity, has this happened to any serious
extent, has anyone been affected physically by this, or is
it a case of "won't someone think of the children"? -John
\_ What benefit is it to the CSUA to have the MOTD anonymous?
(Unlike pretty much every other form of electronic
communication). Is having wall logs "thinking of the
children"?
People should be accountable for what they say. -tom
\_ Do you mean, "Has anyone not gotten involved with the
motd because it is overly caustic?" If so, Yes.
\- non-anon wont solve the causticity problem
\_ Sure, but what was pp asking?
\_ No, has anyone been attacked/gotten in a fight/whatever,
because of what was said on the motd and complained, or
or has the CSUA been told off by a roving gang of UC
lawyers, or is this just a case of "well no, but it
_could_ happen"? Is there a binding definition of
"harassment" from any authority that governs the CSUA?
I'm just curious... -John
\_ People no longer post here. Isn't that enough? How
many more have to be chased off? Just because they
didn't file some sort of 'official' complaint with
politburo, it is ok they left after enough abuse?
Why does someone have to be beaten with a bat for
it to matter?
\_ I seem to recall people complaining about and
leaving the wall too.
There can never be enough chasing. We must
chase unto the hundreds, the thousands, the
hundreds of thousands. They shall all run before
the mighty motd. Kneel before motd.
(anyway, isn't it ironic that in the jblack case,
the only reason he became a "threat target" is
that other people de-anonymized him in the first
place?)
\_ From the minutes:
"Some people want to make [motd] semi-non-anymonous.
We don't want to be in trouble with libel, slander,
threats, etc. ... the people whoa re being attacked
are not complaining about it, it's not really a
problem! the message was just a troll ... we are
sorta sanctioning this simply by keeping it there
and not responding to these kind of threats"
I read this to mean Politburo (4 out of 5) got
freaked out about the GUN DUEL references, even
though it was a troll. Could be wrong.
\_ BUD DAY doesn't like your tone.
\_ Not the gun duel, jblack hater guy
threatening anonymous harrassment and abuse.
/--/
http://csua.com/?entry=39902
I suppose it's good they haven't heard about GUN DUEL
yet ...
\_ Man, can't two consenting adults even talk about
organizing GUN DUEL without everyone getting all
freaky about it? If it was jblack hater being
a weenie, and jblack complaining, that's one thing,
but I don't seem to recall either of the parties
involved in GUN DUEL raising a stink. -John
\_ "the people whoa re being attacked are not
complaining about it ... we are sorta
sanctioning this simply by keeping it there
[etc.]"
\_ So the people who are being attacked are
not complaining. Perhaps they get the joke?
It's the freakin' motd. I barely take the
news links seriously.
\_ They complained. They up and left, duh.
Just because they didn't file an official
complaint and fill out some paper work,
you think it's ok they're not here any
more? The motd is enriched by them
leaving? Sheesh.
\_ And that benefits the CSUA...how? -tom
\_ Allows those who have a minority,
maginalized, or unpopular opinion to
speak out. Allows people to judge the
opinion separately from judging the
person. And allows yermom to accept
all the action she can take without
you feeling bad about it.
\_ We can have an anonymous motd
without the assault and abuse.
I'm totally in favor of what you're
saying right here, but I'm totally
opposed to allowing people to abuse
their anonymous privs to attack
other people. Post your troll
links, post your minority opinion,
but don't expect to get away with
direct personal threats and
assault be it virtual or physical.
\_ I don't care about user tracking as long as our stupid
libertarian stops trolling and nuking the motd.
\- anonymity enables discussion of certain topics that may not
be discussed non-anonymously. non-anonymity, as the wall
very nicely proves, will not make things warm and fuzzy. --psb
\_ The Delaware S. Ct. just ruled on the issue of anon speech
on the internet. If anyone is interested the opinion is at:
http://www.internetcases.com/library/cases/2005-10-05-doe_v_cahill.pdf
Of interest may be the cts assertion that the constitutional
rights of Internet users to speak anonymously must be
"carefully safeguarded."
\- this is about whether the sloda motd should be anonymous
or not. you can support the possibility of anon speech without
being obligated to provide a particular channel. although it
is certainly true there are blurry areas ... like can a town
deny a speech permit to somebody because it will cost thousands
of dollars in police overtime [stipulating that this isnt a
sham excuse]. does it matter whether it is an anti-BUSHCO
parade or a neo-nazi parade [see skokie case] or say a parade
to laude the virtues of IKEA or INNNOUT BURGER. i think one of
the more interesting free speech cases is PRUNEYARD v. ROBBINS.
i am not suggesting you are sugesting a legal obligation here,
but i think it is clear "the csua" can do what it wants with
the motd, just as i think it is clear it is clownheaded to
put these restrictions on the motd. now if somebody else wanted
to created /foo/bar/non-clownlike-motd-for-non-softheaded-adults
which was anonymous and "the CSUA" smacked that down without
a pretty compelling interest ... that would seem to be to be
pretty suspect.
\_ Is the politburo committed to monitoring just motd or any
world writable file which may be used for motd-like purposes?
\- i think they are committed to being clownlike. and to
AssOS 2.6, apparently.
\_ To be fair, these are a bunch of 20-year olds making
political and technical decisions. How high should
our expectations be?
\_ They are 20 yr olds at Cal; we should expect
a bit more than latest 1337est.
\_ I would guess that almost all of us were once
20-year old students at Cal. I was one too. I
think I calibrated my expectations appropriately.
And we are not moving to linux because it's the
latest l337est; we're linux because the vp
couldn't get bsd running. I calibrated my
expectations based on that too (not so much that
he couldn't get it up but rather he's unable to
determine root cause).
\_ The current VP, being completely inept in all
ways, shape, and form, did not try to get
freebsd running. He came in, did nothing, got
chastized for doing nothing, then suddenly
embarked on some sort of religious crusade of
"I'm going to try and get people to stop
calling me inept so I'm going to try and get
new soda working." I have had new soda, for
the most part, working since February. I've
had logins up, home directories mounted, and
about 90% of the other stuff working. Brett
and seidl were great and got apache and list
stuff working, and there was/is only a small
list of stuff left to do. However, despite
my monthly "this is is an explicit list of
all there is left to do that I don't know how
to do," Politburo, and the VP especially,
claim that I don't tell anyone anything.
C'mon! I explicitly said "anyone that can
help, please email me and I'll enable your
login." Instead I get amckee telling
everyone that nothing works because he cannot
log in (I never enabled his login because he
threw a temper tantrum and refused to help).
Anyway, to get back to the point, we tried
loading up new soda with Freebsd 6 this last
weekend to see if the new kernel fixes the
issues we had installing 5.3, but
unfortunately it did not. Mbh decided to load
Gentoo onto the system just to play around and
when it booted decided that he was going to
push to make Gentoo the new OS for soda since
the current system was "unusable" to him. So,
despite the page-long list of reasons that I
provided as to why changing soda to Gentoo
would be a Very Bad Thing(tm), he still wants
to go forward with it because he thinks it is
cool to compile the OS from scratch. The
\_ So it is latest 1337est! Anyway
if he really wants to do this,
why doesn't he try OpenSolaris?
At least it is meant for adults.
-curmudgeon
\_ You can compile freebsd from scratch too.
guy wants to change soda's OS and claims that
he is willing to deal with all the fun that
comes from that, when he had to ask a few
days ago how to find out when someone logged
on last. Sorry about the ventness of this
post, but I have been getting jerked around
by the inept politburo for the past 2 months,
dealing with lie after lie about me and am
trying to fight for some semblence of
rationality, but am getting tired of doing
so. - jvarga
\_ GO JVARGA GO! W00T! -John
\_ From the meeting minutes I couldn't
really figure out what the problem
was other than it won't boot.
BTW, any reason Linux was picked
instead of say OpenSolaris? A
friend of mine works on OpenSolaris,
I could probably get him to help w/
installing it, &c. over winter break.
The zones stuff could be useful on
soda.
\_ Why? They don't want your advice, and if
you are there to help, you are expected to
blindly execute their wishes. Do you
really want to be their house nigger?
\_ um? wow.
\_ If you want to create ~wierdo/sleezepit.motd in your
homedir, where you can slander, insult, and threaten
anyone your welcome to do so according to me. The
CSUA motd should be a place where new students won't
instantly be scared off by the sheer immaturity and
low level of dialogue which occurs there. -mrauser
\_ I am not suggesting that the csua will be violating any
fundamental right by monitoring the motd; the politburo
can implement whatever policy it desires. However, I
think that perhaps they should consider the fact that
some very smart people feel that anon speech is impt.
Re the suggestion that the motd scares people off - this
isn't kindergarten; students admitted to cal ought to
have sufficient critical thinking skills to identify
inanity and ignore it (including perhaps this post).
Some of us were ugs when the motd was far less civilized
AND showed up by default; if we managed to survive viewing
it on a daily basis, the current crop of kids can too.
\- on reflection it is kind of interesting that the CSUA
has not passed a policy decision that "we will be nice
on the motd" but has directly gone to considering
de-anonymizing the motd ... which should make you all
particularly nervous ... since it seems like you are
essentially relying on the "chilling effect" of being
found out to condition behavior. ok say i call somebody
a dumbass and now that can be conclusively tracked back
to me ... am i in violation of csua policy? what policy
am i in violation of? does it matter if the person i am
calling a dumbass is not offended enough to "press charges"?
what if i dont call him a dumbass but give a detail point
by point discussion why he is wrong and this ends up
being far more humiliating than a "mere" ad hominem?
are only point-to-point insults of other sloda people
fair game? what if somebody discusses outsourcing of
programmers or back office stuff and suggests (all)
indians are incompetent programmers or out to use your
private tax info for identify theft type reasons?
is that grounds to piece the veil of anonymity and
smack somebody down? if youa re not even going to entertain
the notion of the smackdown, what is the point of the
ability to deanonymize? and if the smack down is on the
table, what are the grounds. the solitary grounds i can
think possibly for a smackdown is forging a post as
the danhimal iff the danimal complains. say you call
the poliburo "clowns", how many of the pburo would it
take to mount a prosecution? 1? plurality? is it not ok
to call them clowns in the motd, but ok on the wall?
--psb
<<<<<<< Other Changes Below
=======
\_ Please don't un-anonymous the motd, my burgeoning troll farm will
wither. :( -John |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Computer/Domains] UID:40064 Activity:low |
10/13 I have 2 domain names that I don't really care about anymore. If
I choose to cancel it, GoDaddy says I can no longer get it back
or register it until they release it back to the public. If I
select "Do not auto renew" and just don't make payments, will I
get fined?
\_ Why don't you first try to ebay them? Might at least cover your
last payment if it's even semi-interesting. -John
\_ What domain names are they? Maybe we can have a MOTD auction. |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Computer/Rants] UID:40065 Activity:low |
10/13 Gates says Computer Science: For Great Justice:
http://tinyurl.com/9obe4 |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Uncategorized] UID:40066 Activity:nil |
10/13 Al Qaida claims Al Qaida letter is a fake.
http://news.yahoo.com/fc/World/Osama_bin_Laden_and_al_Qaida
\_ The use of little hearts instead of dots was probably a clue. |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Reference/Celebration] UID:40067 Activity:low |
10/13 Boyakasha! Happy Birthday, Ali G! (aka Sacha Baron Cohen)
\_ Ayiii! |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Politics/Domestic/California, Finance/Investment] UID:40068 Activity:high |
10/13 Why I don't think the real-estate will ever bubble. Many young
people seeking for opportunities from inland move to coastal metro
CA. Most asian immigrants to move to CA. The people from the border
love to move to CA. Kids are born and raised in CA. People who
already stay in CA like to stay in CA. The fact of the matter is,
regardless of the economy the CA population is still rising and
there is a shortage of land. We talk about bubble as if people will
all of a sudden will lose their jobs or move to apartments or
move out of the state. Wouldn't such a movement trigger an apartment
rental boom, which is unlikely since many are already close to full
occupancy anyways? Real-estate bubble-- wishful thinking,
it'll never happen.
\_ Do you have statistics to show that the Bay Area population is
growing? I read an article that claimed the opposite.
\_ There's an artificial shortage of land, in reality there is
no shortage of land in CA. If the population does increase to
a certain size we'll just expand the burbs is all. All you have
to do is travel down interstates between the two large metropolitan
areas of LA-OC-SD and the Bay Area and you can see the large
amount of empty room still available. But real statistics show
that the Bay Area has been losing population, contrary to
popular belief, and that the growth has been in SoCal and
Sac.
\_ I think it's a matter of perspective. The housing bubble is not
going to be like the stock market bubble. Houses won't end up
being worthless. The problem are those people who are betting
their property will continue to increase in worth by double digits
and those who will get caught by the increasing high interest.
The bubble will be stagnant markets, or slightly depressed prices.
\_ actually considering that most people are financing their homes,
likening it to stock merket would be likening it to a stock
market heavy on margin traders. If someone only puts up 10% down
on real eastate, it only takes a 10% drop for them to lose it
all. Because of the heavy leverage, small changes in the
market can produce big losses!
The one saving grace is real eastate is not very liquid. It
won't take a week for the market to crash ; it'll take months.
\_ Sorry, but people from the border can't afford the million $
homes. As for CA kids, they will all just live with their
parents. For speculators, if home prices don't rise, they will
be bleeding money, and hence looking to sell. Inflation is
rising and the fed is forced to keep raising rates. Add to
that outsourcing, trade deficit, budget deficit, high consumer
debt, and an overall ugly economy, and even though I wish to
say housing would just calm down and stagnate, I have to be
honest, and tell you that, more likely, it would pop and fall
like 20%. - worried homeowner
\_ If this real estate bubble is anything like the last one in the
Bay Area, I wouldn't worry too much. Even if prices start
falling, it won't do dramatically. Incomes and prices are high
enough that you can sell if need be.
\_ Actually, the new immigrants are able to afford quite a lot.
How? They share. It's common for several families of new Mexican
immigrants to share a house. In this way, I've seen even day
laborers buy a $400K house. Yes, this constrains prices
because at some point income is always a limiting factor. By
the way, why are you worried about a 20% drop? That's
nothing. So your $500K house falls to $400K. BFD.
\_ if you spent $100k down on that $500k house, after the 20%
drop, that $100k of equity is GONE. If you borrowed it all,
you're now $100k in debt; selling the house would leave you
still well in the red.
\_ Uhm no. If I put $100k down on a $500k house and the sell
price drops 20% I have the option of "not selling" since I
live there. If I was a speculator I'd probably take a hit
since a 20% drop is unlikely to recover quickly in which
case I'd lose a tiny amount of the millions I'd made over
the last 5-10 years. Too bad I wasn't a speculator. ;-)
\_ Not selling is all fine and dandy if everyone took
out 30 year fixed mortgages. Unfortunately, there are
too many 1 year, 3 year ARMs, no interest, blah blah
mortgages these days. I am not worried about my own
home per se, but a deflating housing bubble pulling
the whole economy down. IIRC, something like half of
the jobs created lately are real estate related.
\_ I think the real estate market in CALIFORNIA will be a good
investment IN THE LONG RUN precisely because the population
here is growing quickly. However, this is not true in most
places.
\_ Yea, in the long run, stock market goes up too, but like my
old Numerical Analysis TA says, "Why are we learning this
faster algorithm? Cause LIFE IS SHORT!"
\_ Look, do you want to invest or are you trying to win the
lottery? If you're not in it for the long-term then just
go to Vegas already. Many people have long-term goals and
accomplish them by staying the course. That doesn't mean
to ignore short-term fluctuations, but most of us here are
quite far from retirement age and have time on our side.
\_ "Yea, things are overpriced, but you need to get in or
you will miss the boat. Just invest for the long term."
That's what they say at the height of the internet
bubble too.
\_ Maybe. On the other hand, I thought we were at the
top 4 years ago (when I bought). I needed a place
to live. I wouldn't buy an investment property
right now. However, I'd buy a 'home' if I needed
one and could afford it.
\_ How far off is the DOW/NAS/etc now from where they were
at the top of the dotocm bubble?
\_ nasdaq: 5000 (top of bubble 5+ years ago), 2000 (now)
\_ The End Is Nigh:
http://www.golyon.com/images/sacsvs.png
http://www.golyon.com/pricingtrends_f.htm |
| 2005/10/13 [Health/Disease/AIDS] UID:40069 Activity:nil |
10/13 Is Drudge trying to, um, tell us something by making this one of his
top stories:
"Suddenly at the forefront of taking sex aids mainstream, conservative
marketer Johnson & Johnson almost overnight has doubled sales of its
once-sleepy K-Y brand for the second time in four years thanks to the
blockbuster summer rollout of a new line of massage oils. And nowhere
has that success been greater than at Wal-Mart, where K-Y Touch
Massage oils have hit the list of top 10 new health and beauty
products of 2005, according to J&J VP-Personal Care Marketing Jim
Peterson."
\_ I think he's trying to tell us that J&J has doubled their sales of
their once-sleepy K-Y brand. What did you have in mind?
\_ I think he's trying to say that liberal is the new conservative.
\_ ??? |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:40070 Activity:kinda low |
10/13 http://news.yahoo.com/photos/ss/events/pl/081201presidentbush Photo op where soldiers read to Dubya only good news \_ Great headline: "Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged" http://news.yahoo.com/fc/US/Bush_Administration \_ "We're an empire now, we create our own reality" http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/sloth/2004-10-16b.html |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:40071 Activity:kinda low |
10/13 Polls don't matter!
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051013/pl_nm/bush_politics_dc
\_ I can't remember where I saw this, but apparently one of these
polls give Bush a 2 percent approval rating among blacks.
2 percent!
\_ WSJ/NBC News poll. 89 blacks surveyed. I guess that means
2 out of 89 said "do approve". A Pew poll showed 12%.
\_ Yeah, obviously, margin of error is high. Still, 2 percent!
\_ That's within a margin of error of being zero. Neat! |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Computer/HW/Memory] UID:40072 Activity:nil |
10/13 Remember rapidly climbing memory prices? All the memory makers were
in on it.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/10/13/samsung.price.fixing.ap/index.html |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Science/Disaster, Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:40073 Activity:low |
10/13 Hi motd, while the press releases are saying shit like "Katrina
floodwaters not as toxic as thought", I'm going to quote from the ACS-
sponsored journal article:
"What distinguishes Katrina floodwaters are their large volume and the
human exposure to these pollutants that accompanied the flood rather
than extremely elevated concentrations of toxic pollutants."
http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/sample.cgi/esthag/asap/html/es0518631.html
In other words, the floodwaters were as shitty and bacteria-laden as
"typical" storm run-off, but this time it's up to your neck as opposed
to something you can hop over at the curb. -Former Chem 1A/B TA
\_ After a month of toxic flood talk, it's just hard to get too
excited over the more realistic appraisal. |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Uncategorized] UID:40074 Activity:nil |
10/13 First PSP Trojan:
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3144414 |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Finance/Investment] UID:40075 Activity:nil |
10/13 Was watching Jim Cramer on Mad Money. Guy was calling in on
how likely Fed is gonna raise rates. Jim Cramer says it's
simple, Fed is going to continue raising rates until the housing
bubble pops.
\_ Err, isn't the Fed raising rates because of inflation?
\_ I wonder how directly the interest rate now ties into rising
prop values. Sure, the initial huge gains were triggered by
low rates. But later it has been the spectacle of previous
huge gains that drive investors to keep buying and flipping
to each other without much regard to interim monthly payments. |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Consumer/Audio] UID:40076 Activity:moderate |
10/13 MP3 player breast implants?
http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_1570835.html?menu=news.quirkies
\_ Why not just put zippers on the bottoms? |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Computer/SW/OS/Solaris] UID:40077 Activity:high |
10/13 I know how to set up nis master/slave services on a solaris (8)
box. But given already set up services, how can I tell which
is master and which is slave?
\_ 'ypwhich -m' is what you want. The master server is encoded into
the NIS maps themselves. -ERic
\_ ypwhich? iirc, the master should tell you that it is its
own master and the slave should tell you that the other
machine is the master. I'm not sure if this works for nis+.
\_ hmm, really? in linux-land i have seen SlaveNIServerX
respond to a yphich which "SlaveNIServerX"
\_ I think I'm wrong, maybe 'ypwhich -m hosts' (or some
other map) might work.
\- you can use something like this:
rpcinfo -p <host> |grep -q ypxfrd && echo "ypmaster" || echo "not_ypmaster"
rpcinfo -p <host> |grep -q ypxfrd && echo YPMASTER || echo NOT_YPMASTER
obviously you can loop over something like
foreach i (`ypcat ypservers`). --psb |
| 2005/10/13-14 [Politics/Domestic/911, Politics/Domestic/Immigration] UID:40078 Activity:moderate |
10/13 http://michellemalkin.com/archives/003576.htm Bush learned his lesson about appointing incompetent cronies to head important government agencies, right? Oh shit, no he didn't! \_ Michelle Malkin should not be cited as an authority on anything. \_ Fortunately there are dozens of others saying the same thing all over the internet. |
| 3/15 |